Tag Archives: world-building

When Thomas wakes up inside a metal box, he remembers nothing about his former life except his first name. Then the box opens, and he becomes the latest in a series of monthly arrivals in a boys’ camp from hell. The teens live in a Glade at the center of a huge maze. Some of them have been there up to two years. No one has ever found a way out. The walls move during ... Read More »

The Lost Journals of Ven Polypheme, allegedly discovered in an archeological dig and reconstructed by an expert scholar, relate the experiences of a young explorer in a long-ago world full of magical races, objects, and stories. In this third book, following The Floating Island and The Thief Queen’s Daughter, Ven and his friends flee from the frying pan to the fire. By “frying pan” I mean the Inner Market, walled up inside the Gated City, ... Read More »

When Cole and his sixth-grader friends troop down the basement steps to view a spooky, Halloween house of horrors, they’re more worried about whether they’re too old to go trick-or-treating than about being kidnapped. But the basement is already nearly full of caged kids waiting to be forced down a ladder in the floor. Cole manages to hide until everybody has gone down the hole, wondering how anyone could think of getting away with kidnapping ... Read More »

I’ve never read anything by Brandon Sanderson before, and I’m generally leery of thick fantasy novels that have the look of “Book One of a Punishingly Long Series.” Three things convinced me to give this book a try. First is the fact that, although it was his first published novel back in 2005, Sanderson hasn’t written any sequels to it… yet. I’m told he plans to, but so far all he has rolled out is ... Read More »

In The Floating Island, we first met Ven Polypheme, an unusual specimen of the ancient Nain race. Unlike the typical Nain, whose idea of a good time is to dig ore out of a mountain’s roots, Ven’s family lives in a human city and specializes in building ships. Unlike other members of his large, practical family, Ven has the itchy feet of an explorer. And unlike practically anyone else in known history, Ven has survived ... Read More »

When I saw this book at the public library, I thought it had a striking design. This, including loads of quirky but beautiful illustrations, is the work of Carson Ellis, who has also decorated books by Lemony Snicket and Trenton Lee Stewart. As for the author, I thought his name sounded familiar. Only later, after I had brought the book home, did I connect it with the alternative-rock band The Decembrists, of which Colin Meloy ... Read More »

The fifth and final book of “The Parasol Protectorate” confronts Lady Alexia Maccon, née Tarabotti, and her team of supernatural sleuths, with a mystery that reaches back into ancient Egypt. Intertwined with this mystery are a present-day murder case, a dark secret that threatens to break up the pack of werewolves led by Alexia’s Alpha husband, and the lingering puzzle of the father she never knew. And so a racy, funny series of romantic whodunits, ... Read More »

After reading the first book in the Beyonders trilogy, I decided to drop everything and go to the library to fetch Book 2. This turned into a whirlwind tour of five (5) library branches, after which I came home with two armloads of books to read. Happily, I was able to get my hands on this, the middle book of the trilogy, and read it with an exquisitely tuned balance between relish and haste. And ... Read More »

Thirteen-year-old Jason is an ordinary, baseball-playing, zoo-volunteering kid from Colorado, until the day he hears music coming out of a hippopotamus. Leaning closer, he falls into the hippo’s mouth, slides down a long chute, and comes out at the bottom of a hollow tree in a completely different world. It’s not how most visitors from our reality find their way to the magical land of Lyrian. Later, Jason meets a girl his age named Rachel, ... Read More »

The second book of Lyonesse concludes this most unusual variant of the Arthurian legend, based on the folklore of the author’s native Isles of Scilly, off the southwest tip of Britain. It follows up on The Well Between the Worlds, which seemed such an engaging and original work of fantasy that I had read half of it before I realized that the resemblance between its characters’ names and figures associated with King Arthur was more ... Read More »

WARNING: SPOILER ALERT!!! We discuss plot and narrative points within both the "Cuckoo's Calling" and "Silkworm" novels by Robert Galbraith. Please read these amazing novels before listening to this show! MuggleNet Academia is a comprehensive insight into the literary thematic elements and scholastic endeavors that author J.K. Rowlin […]

MuggleNet interviews Stefan Coisson to discuss the Harry Potter TCG (Trading Card Game) tournament that is taking place at Gen Con 2015 in Indianapolis, IN USA. In this interview, we discuss the game's history and play as well as the tournament layout for Gen Con 2015. We are hoping to see a resurgence of this game from the early 2000's when it was […]

In Creevey Wizard Comics, the Green Knight aids those in need under the cloak of darkness. Scorpius Malfoy prefers spending his nights with Rose Weasley, but like the Green Knight he makes his own rules--whether Super Wizard Harry Potter likes it or not.

It took Harry and his friends years to discover who killed Colin Creevey. Ginny and Luna's classmate is the only person whose killer remains free. It is 2001, and the search has been ongoing for a year. Will the killer ever be brought to justice?